Return of Chaos
by jadetiger70
Summary: After the defeat of Kronos, things are going great for the demigods, but Eris is discontent with the lack of chaos the Gods let her produce and sets out to overthrow them and set up a pantheon of chaos. Can she be stopped before she enacts her plan?
1. Chapter 1

I looked out through the glass doors to see if we had a chance to get any farther before we should find a place to sleep. As I looked out, I remembered I had heard that we were due for a particularly severe blizzard that night and I prayed that it would wait awhile and happen the night, but alas, it wasn't so. We'd have to stow away in one of the stores in the mall. All of a sudden, I felt a tug on my sleeve and turned towards a small girl with dark blue and purple-striped black hair. Her sapphire-blue eyes locked with mine and she asked, "Zahi, can we go see Santa? We aren't going to be able to leave the mall tonight, right?"

Gazing away from her and through the clear glass doors of the mall, I thought over what could go wrong. "Sure," I answered to her hopeful face, "but don't mention anything about the fact that we're runaways." In response to this, she smiled and wrapped her arms around me in a grateful hug.

"I won't. Promise," she assured me as she dropped her hug to drag me over to the line to see the big man in the red suit. We stood in line for about five minutes before I stepped out, told Zyli that I'd be back, and left to get a Coke. By the time I'd returned, there was only one person in front of Zyli, so I sneaked up close enough to "Santa" to hear what Zyli would ask for because, despite the fact that we're runaways, I still have to get something for her for Christmas. The little, blonde-haired boy that was previously in front of Zyli, jumped off of Santa's lap, and ran back to his mother while Zyli ran up and climbed onto the big man's lap.

"Ho ho ho!" the big man laughed, "Aren't you a sweet little girl. What would you like for Christmas, sweetie?" The elf stood by the toy sack and waited for her response so he could pull out the toy that she wanted.

Zyli, however wasted no time in replying, "I want you and my brother to have the best Christmas this year." It was immediately obvious that her response forced the elf and big man to drop their jaws on the floor. "I know that you live alone with Mrs. Claus in the North Pole, so I figured that you didn't get many Merry Christmases, and since you're here, I thought I'd tell you myself," she continued, oblivious to the tasered visages of the elf and big man. Darn, I really shouldn't have believed that she would ask for a material possession. I guess that breed of selflessness came from not receiving much anything for Christmas, or any other reason, for around four years.

"Why thank you little girl," the big man said as he got over his shock, "But would you like anything else?" Apparently he was uncomfortable with the situation, much more so than the green clothed elf, that much was evident by his expression.

"If it's not too much trouble, do you have a crossword puzzle book that I can have?" she asked, once again oblivious to the renewed looks of shock that the request earned her. Yup, that was my little sister. Being about as big as a five year old probably didn't boost the big man's sense of normalcy, either.

"Um, I'm not sure if we have any of those left," the big man said uncertainly, no doubt hoping that she'd believe him and ask for something else, when he was interrupted by the elf. The elf came over carrying a crossword puzzle book, while he said " Here's one boss."

"Thanks, Santa! And you too, Mr. Elf!" she exclaimed cheerfully as she gave the big man an enormous hug and jumped off his lap to come find me. I quickly went back to the end of the line before she arrived there so that she wouldn't suspect me of eavesdropping, not that she'd mind, but it's the thought of it that matters. That also meant that she didn't know I was the one to put the crossword puzzle book in the sack, which was a plus. I'm not, nor was I ever, well known for doing nice things to people. So far, Zyli's the only exception to my unniceness.

"Zahi!" she said as she jumped the last five feet from me to latch onto me with her flying ninja hug, "Look at what I got from Santa!"

Glancing at the object with what I hoped could be taken as curiosity, I spoke, "A new crossword puzzle book? Don't you have like a dozen of those?"

"Yeah, but I told you that I finished all of those already, remember?" she replied matter-of-factly.

"Oh yeah, I do remember you mentioning something like that," I said, feigning a remembering look. "Come on, kiddo. We need to find a store to stow away in for the night. Preferably one with blankets, beds, and pillows, though I won't get my hopes up." Shifting her to my hip and proceeded to find a store that we could sleep in for the night. After a while we found a nice little shop that included a furniture section with beds.

"Okay, Zyli, ready to invisible up?" I asked her after we had climbed underneath a large bed. All I got was a brisk nod before she, the crossword puzzle book, and the pen she was using disappeared. That was one of our unique abilities that stemmed off from a larger group. I could manipulate light and heat, while she could manipulate cold and darkness. We don't actually become invisible though, it's more like we put on extremely awesome camouflage.

"Hey, Zahi," Zyli asked after, according to my silver, generic watch, thirty minutes, "what's a eight-lettered word for a mythical dog beast?"

"I don't know," I replied while interrogating my memory reserves for anything that my history teacher may have told us about mythical dog beasts. "Does it ask for a specific set of myths? If not try Cerberus, that's the only one I can think of."

"It fits!" she exclaimed quietly, "Thanks, Zahi.""No prob," I replied with an unseen smile. "I'm going to hit the hay, okay? If they show up, get me up quick." I needed to get some sleep. I hadn't slept since we stayed out behind that gas station two days ago. After a little tossing and turning, I decided to climb out and onto the bed and coerced Zyli to clamber out and relax in a nice, soft-looking, blue easy chair that was not too far from the black-framed bed. After I laid down, prayed that I wouldn't have any nightmares, and relaxed, I tumbled into the comforting abyss of sleep.

----

"Zahi, why are they chasing us?" Zyli had asked innocently. She had sounded like she was teetering between crying and holding it in until we came to a place we could rest. It had made me so furious I had almost broken my fist on the brick wall that we had been leaning against, which isn't exactly unusual about me, but still, the thought was there.

"I don't know, Zyli, but I do know that... wait I think they're coming again," I had peeked around the corner as I said the last part and had seen them. The pair had been coming from a different direction then the monsters had been, but they couldn't fool me, I knew they were in league with the monsters. They had been walking slowly, probably trying to spot us before we spotted them. We had seen them many times before. Even in the darkness, I had been able to tell that the one on the left had been black haired and olive-skinned and the one on the right had been pale- skinned, but also had black hair. The olive-skinned boy had been wearing an aviator's jacket, like always, but from our recent encounters, I was probably right in assuming that he had been wearing a black t-shirt and blue jeans with a skull ring on his finger even though I couldn't make out exact details.

His cohort on the other hand, had probably been wearing that stupid orange t-shirt that proclaimed "Camp Half-Blood." He had also more than likely been wearing blue jeans and holding that stupid little pen in his hand as he had at every one of our previous encounters.

After examining the view, I had pulled my head back around the corner at the same time that I had tilted it to catch the sounds the monsters had made. They had still sounded far-off if the cries of the half-seal dogs and the, larger than they should be, dogs were to be believed, but the shrieks of the part-donkey, part-bronze, part-human freaks had sounded a lot closer than the dog things.

Two things had happened then. The shrieking freaks had jumped out of the bushes at us and the two stalkers had popped their heads around the corner. Out of reflex, I had picked up the silverish looking metal pipe that I had been using to defend myself and my sister from the monsters and lifted it as one of the freaks jumped. Needless to say, it had impaled itself and died, but I had been shocked to see it burst into a cloud of dust. It had taken a tug on my sleeve from Zyli to pull me out of my shock and take note of my surroundings. The two boys had been fighting the freaks (the dog things had yet to catch up) with swords. The olive-skinned boy's had been a dark, impenetrable black color while the the other one's had been a glowing bronze color.

Then I had pulled Zyli up and around the corner of the building to the front where I had been confronted by a fearsome creature that looked to be half-bull and half-man and a weird looking lion. The minotaur (I had remembered what the half-bull thing was called) had been decked out in glowing bronze armor and had had a pair of sickening horns protruding from the greasy mess of fur on his head. The lion, on the other hand, had looked just like a lion, except for his fur, which had looked as though it was stronger then regular fur, ridiculous as that sounds.

Before the minotaur, or lion could have done anything, however, a explosion rocked the ground. I had assumed that the gas tank in the back had exploded and I had quickly got back up on my feet. As I had quickly scanned the ground for the metal pipe that I had dropped, I had seen Zyli laying on the ground. I had tried to get her up, but she wasn't responding and it wasn't until my hand had accidentally touched the blood that had been laying on her forehead that I understood why. A shingle from the roof of the gas station had flown off from the force of the explosion and nailed my little sister in the head.

I had heard a thud, which pulled me out of my shock(again), and had looked up to see the minotaur and lion start to charge us. As if a gift from a divine being, I had seen my pipe laying about three feet from where I had fallen. Almost without thinking, I had thrown said pipe like a javelin as I thanked God for my track and field days, at the gas pumps, which had promptly exploded, turning the lion and minotaur into dust like their freaky friend behind the building. I hadn't seen how the minotaur died, but I had seen the lion get a three foot, red hot, metal spike thrust up through the roof of its mouth. The weird thing, though, was that the lion had left behind its pelt.After having checked to make sure the coast was clear, I had run up and grabbed the pelt and had used it to cover Zyli's wound and to prevent further bleeding. I may have failed my first aid test, but I still remember how to treat a slightly complex cut. It had then taken me two days to steal a wagon and use said wagon to carry Zyli all the way to the nearest town/city despite her protests that she was fine.

----

I was brought out of my sub-conscious flashback when Zyli shook me violently and shouted, "They're here, Zahi! Wake up!"


	2. Chapter 2

**Okay, I know that last time I forgot to include an author's note. I'm forgetful like that. Anyway, this chapter focuses mainly on Percy and Nico's quest to find Zahi and Zyli, and continues where the last chapter left off after delving into a little bit of backstory. This, and all other chapters not focusing on Zahi or Zyli, will be written in third person to prevent the confusion of shifting first person among the characters.**

**On a side note, I realized, with the help of Daughters of Night, that the line used to signify the flashback got moved up a couple of lines. The first line is supposed to be three spaces down and the second is supposed to be two spaces down. Sorry for any confusion that that may have caused.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Percy Jackson and the Olympians, Rick Riordan does. If you didn't know that, you probably shouldn't be reading this.**

"Which way did you say they were heading, Nico?" Percy said as he attempted, unsuccessfully, to decipher a map of the surrounding area with his dyslexic eyes. They were sitting on a hard, green bench at bus stop. They weren't really trying to catch a bus, unlikely due to the huge amount of traffic on that particular winter morning, but they were getting frustrated with their quest to bring the two new half-bloods to Camp. They never seemed able to catch them at an opportunity that would be suitable for convincing them to come to Camp Half-Blood. _It doesn't make sense,_ Percy found himself thinking more and more often, _The male should have been claimed by now, and their names aren't on the list of the gods' children either._

"They were heading north when they blew the pumps of that gas station to Tartarus. We could always summon Mrs. O'Leary to sniff them out," Nico suggested as he peeked at the map to provide deciphering assistance. "The maps upside down."

"Really?" Percy questioned as he squinted his eyes to see the map clearer.

"Yeah, the N's backwards, I think," Nico replied while also squinting his eyes.

"Screw this," Percy said as he crushed the map angrily in his hands. "Call Mrs. O'Leary." Nico nodded and used his black as a black hole, Stygian iron sword to summon a spirit, give it orders to get Mrs. O'Leary, and dismissed it. A few moments later, an impossibly large, black dog appeared and tackled Percy. "Down, girl, down!" Percy exclaimed while laughing and receiving many odd looks from passerbys.

After calming the big dog down, they gave her the scent sample, hopped on her back, and told her to find the half-bloods. "Once we get there, how are we supposed to get them to come with us?" Nico asked as Mrs. O'Leary dashed among the pedestrians on their way to the target. "They dash off every time they see us."

"I don't know. We could try kidnapping them, but I don't think Chiron would approve of that particular method," Percy replied while scratching his chin thoughtfully. "We could also try blocking all the exits in order to force them to listen to us."

"Yeah, let's go with that plan," Nico said as he yawned loudly, "I think we should get a little shut eye before we get there though."

"Okay, but how are we going to sleep on Mrs. O'Leary without falling off?" Percy said as he too succumbed to the contagious yawns.

"I have rope," Nico stated as he reached around in his backpack for the rope. Several minutes later, Percy and Nico were sleeping on the back of Mrs. O'Leary, tied down with the rope, as she sped toward the elusive demigods.

* * *

Two hours later (they were really off in their calculations) Mrs. O'Leary stopped at a mall complex and shook herself until her passengers were fully awake. After slicing the rope, Nico and Percy hoped off of Mrs. O'Leary and entered the complex, excited, well-rested, and ready to go. Thus, they entered, after Nico had picked the lock to the entrance, with Mrs. O'Leary riding point. Eventually they were lead to a small shop that was located towards the back of the complex and Nico picked the lock again. Just before they entered, however, they heard shuffling feet, snarls, and other odd sounds for that time of night. Then they heard the girl demigod yell, "They're here, Zahi! Wake up!" before the large glass windows to their right exploded inward as several empousai, hellhounds, and telekhines jumped in and started to charge their way to the two demigods.

"Come on! We need to get to them before the monsters do!" Percy yelled as he pulled out Anaklusmos and started charging while also slashing at monsters if they got too close. Nico followed suit, running after Percy after drawing his pitch black, Stygian iron sword. When they arrived at the source of the earlier yell, the monsters were already there, but instead of two dead demigods, they saw a multitude of physical, 3-D shadows that were holding sick, wicked swords, spears, and axes, as well as the occasional hammer-type weapon.

Among the shadows, however, were flying balls of light that sought out the monsters and exploded in their faces, which should have also cleared away the shadows, but they just stood here and there killing monsters that got too close. On the back of every shadow was a black cord-type thing that led to the small girl's fingertips, many on each finger. The fingers remained still, but every so often the cord connecting to the back of a shadow twitched and the shadow moved to strike down an enemy.

Percy signaled to Nico and began walking around the shadow beings with Nico following the older boy's lead. Once they made it to the end of the shadow beings, they turned a corner and they attempted to finally talk to one of the two demigods while the monsters were being kept busy by the shadow beings. "Hey," Percy began, but was cut off by a ball of light to the face.

As Percy vigorously rubbed his eyes to remove the spot of light that spread across his vision, Zahi yelled, "Call off your monsters! Your outnumbered, there's no way you can win."

"They're not our monsters, you dolt! Or haven't you noticed the fact that they try to kill us too?" Nico yelled back as Percy finally stopped scraping his eyelids off.

"We've been trying to talk to you and tell you about a safe place that you can come with us to," Percy added in as his eyes finally adjusted to the lack of light.

"Yeah, well what if I don't believe you! I wouldn't trust you stalkers as far as I could throw you!" Zahi shouted back, preparing another ball of light.

"Listen, you little..." Nico started to say, but was cut off by a soft, but still audible, thud from behind Zahi, and the mysterious disappearance of the shadow beings. Zahi turned around and was struck speechless as his eyes took in the arrow protruding from his little sister's prone form. Immediately, he was over the prone form, examining the arrow and amount of blood lost.

"Percy, can you take down all of the monsters?" Nico asked as he also examined the wounded area of the little girl. Percy nodded before he jumped over the barricade of couches, chairs, tables, mattresses, and other furniture that the two children had set-up, and started slashing his way through every monster that happened to land in his field of vision. Because Percy had bathed in the River Styx two years ago, he was invincible. The monsters learned this when their weapons shattered on contact with his skin, but they didn't have much time to retain that info due to Percy slashing them to dust two seconds after being hit.

"Don't remove that arrow!" Nico shouted as Zahi grabbed hold of the shaft. "We need something to cauterize the wound and prevent further bleeding."

"Well how do we do that?" Zahi replied desperately, just wanting the arrow to be removed from his sister's limp form.

"We need something really hot, something that will dry the blood quickly when we remove the arrow," Nico replied, looking around for said source of heat.

"Oh, well I can create the heat. You just remove the arrow," Zahi responded as he rubbed his hands together in preparation. Nico, seeing the determined look on the younger boy's face and knowing that he wouldn't listen to reason, complied and yanked the arrow out. Zahi placed his hands on the wounded area and Nico was tased by the steam coming from the wounded area. After about ten seconds, Zahi withdrew his hands with a mumbled, "Don't want to burn her," as Nico touched the, now dry and non-bleeding, wounded area. Percy had also finished killing all of the monsters at about the time that this happened and thus came to examine the arrow while Nico got over his shock.

"C'mon, we need to get her to Camp," Percy stated matter-of-factly after he had finished examining the arrow.

"Wait a minute! Who says we're going with you guys anyway?!" Zahi shouted as he picked up his limp, seemingly lifeless, sister.

"This arrow was poisoned," Percy stated as he tossed it into the trash. "It wasn't a super strong poison, but it still stronger than the resources we have with us. The way I see it is that you can come with us to Camp, or you're sister dies. That's all there is to it."

"Okay, we'll come, but how do you expect us to get there quickly, genius?" Zahi questioned with an severely sarcastic (you'd have to be denser than a black hole to miss it) tone after what had been a long pause.

"We'll need to Iris message Chiron and have him send Argus to come get us," Nico said quickly, signaling to Percy to do his water-voodoo-magic thing and create a mist in the air. Percy complied and pulled out a Drachma, Olympian money, and handed it to Nico.

"Oh, Iris, Goddess of the Rainbow, accept my offering," Nico said as he tossed the coin into the mist. "Show me Chiron, Camp Half-Blood." Shortly afterward, an elderly looking man in a wheelchair appeared in the mist.

"Nico?" He inquired, but didn't seemed fazed by the fact that he was seeing a person in a cloud of mist. "Is everything alright?"

"Yeah, well, no not really. We found the half-bloods, but one of them got poisoned and we don't have the resources to heal her," Nico explained quickly, "We need you to send Argus as fast as possible so that we can take them to Camp."

"Okay, but where are you," Chiron asked as a man in the background walked by holding a can of Diet Coke and playing a Gameboy Advance.

"Oh dangit! I don't know where we are! Well, um, wait a minute! Nevermind, Chiron I have a better way to get to camp," Nico said as he swung his hand, rather violently, through the mist.

"What's this 'better' way of travel you're talking about, Nico," Percy inquired as he sat in one of the easy chairs.

"We're going to shadow travel, Percy," Nico declared with a smile at his brilliant idea. "We can use Mrs. O'Leary and I to take all of us to Camp. I'll take Zahi, while you and the girl can travel on Mrs. O'Leary." Upon hearing her name, Mrs. O'Leary bounded and hopped her way over to the group away from her chew toys (aka the furniture). Then Percy wasted no time in taking the girl from the boy and hopping onto the back of Mrs. O'Leary, despite Zahi's protests about not going with his sister.

"Don't care," Nico snapped as he grabbed hold of the boy's arm and shadow traveled at the same time Percy told Mrs. O'Leary, "Camp Half-Blood," and she too shadow traveled to the specified location.

**Hope you enjoyed chapter two, but I must ask. Do you think that the chapters are two short? I considered making this one longer, but I decided that that was a good place to end it. Also, what do you think of the plot? The spelling? Please tell me what you think in a review, or pm if you're not comfortable typing a review, but don't send flames, there really isn't any reason for that.**

**PS: Can anyone guess who Zahi/Zyli's godly parent is/are?**


	3. Chapter 3

**I don't have much to say at this point, except thanks to Daughters of Night, who has, so far been my only reviewer, so on with the show(to ease any possible confusion, this story take place from Zahi, the brother's, point of view).**

**Disclaimer: Rick Riordan owns Percy Jackson and the Olympians. I, sadly, do not.**

Shadow traveling was pretty fun. And if you believed that, I've got a million dollar cruise liner for you. It actually felt like every fiber of my being was being compressed, vacuum-packed, and repeatedly poked by an extremely persistent needle. I also couldn't see, hear, taste, or smell anything, which is not a prospect that I'm comfortable with at all. After our short trip, though it seemed to take infinitely longer to me, through Hell, we arrived on top of a hill overlooking a sprawling, oddly-designed camp.

A big, red house, an arena of some sort, and an archery range were placed to the right of the camp, while an enormous strawberry field smothered the left with the help of a huge lake, and a lava-spewing, rock wall took up the opposite end. In the middle of the camp were three rows of cabins, arrayed in a u-shape pattern, that spread outwards with some that were incomplete, but the majority were whole. They looked awesomely detailed, each one worthy of being sculpted by Michelangelo. I saw one that looked to have risen out of the sea, one that seemed to have been built on clouds, and still another that appeared to have grown out of the ground.

The view was breathtaking for sure, but I soon remembered my little sister that was laying on the back of that monster dog. After rushing over as fast as a deer, I gently yanked Zyli off of the dog-thing. I was holding her somewhat bridal style, one arm underneath her knees and the other supporting her head and upper back. Almost immediately, I heard galloping hooves and glanced over to see a half-horse, half-man and was forced to do a double-take. I mean it's not like I see a half-horse, half-man come galloping towards me everyday.

"Percy! Nico! Are these the two half-bloods you were sent to lead here?" the horse-man shouted from about ten yards away. By this point we were starting to gather the attention of the various campers and I was getting kind of fidgety from their stares. I never really did well with attention, childhood problems and all that, but I digress.

"Yeah, but the younger one's poisoned, Chiron!" Percy yelled back, and I was pulled out of my fidgety state by the ferocity of the shout. It was enough to make you think that he was yelling at a person on the other side of a football field.

"Oh dear. I think it would be best if we took her to the Big House," Chiron said as he finally reached us. Percy then tried to take Zyli from me, but I wouldn't let him touch her with a thirty-nine and a half foot pole. So I told him to lead the way or point me to the Big House, and off we went.

About halfway there, Zyli stirred in her poison induced sleep and muttered something incoherent, to which I replied with a soothing, melodious hum that matched a lullaby my grandma used to sing when I couldn't sleep. I didn't sing it for two main reasons: a.) I would've been embarrassed from singing in public, and b.) I probably would've been arrested for skinning a live cat that had a severe vocal infection.

By the time we arrived at the Big House, Zyli had fallen back into a sound sleep. I took her up to the room that Chiron led me to and laid her down on the bed. Chiron then produced a graham cracker square type thing and I inquired, "What is that?"

He looked up and responded calmly, "Ambrosia, the food of the gods. It heals demigods who eat it, but they can't eat too much or they'll die."

"Oh, well let me feed it to her," I stated in return as I snatched the square and split it into eight pieces, "By the way, what's a demigod?" At this point, I had my back turned to him and was feeding the pieces to Zyli, one at a time. Now, I know your thinking, "How did she eat them?" so I'll tell you. They were small enough to swallow without choking, and with the help of a glass of water, that's what she did.

"I'll tell you later when your sister wakes up, okay?" He stated as he left the room, after also saying that he'll be right back. True to his word, he was back in about a minute, with a small eight ounce glass of this odd-looking, liquid stuff. "This is nectar, the drink of the gods. If you pour it into her mouth, it will do the same thing as the ambrosia. I need you to give this to her in four hours. I'll send up Karuna and Jason to help out a little bit." With that he left, but after a few minutes two kids came in the door.

The boy was blonde and fair-skinned, but he was also kind of weedy. He seemed vain and full of himself, with a smug grin on his face and a hand running through his hair. He was wearing a shirt just like that Percy kid. Bright orange and proclaiming "Camp Half-Blood" to anyone who dared to look. The girl was also wearing the same type of t-shirt, but unlike the arrogant kid, she was slightly tanned with brown hair. She was, again unlike the arrogant kid, slightly muscular, as if she constantly worked out.

"Sup, I'm Jason, son of Apollo, and this is Karuna," the blonde said, voice full of arrogance. I just rolled my eyes while Karuna gave an annoyed sigh.

"And I'm Zahi. Pleasure to meet you, Karuna," I said, purposely leaving Jason's name out of my reply. My ploy worked, Jason was clearly peeved at being ignored and was about to say something, no doubt rude, when I motioned to my little sister.

Grunting, he stated dismissively, "Oh, right. I'm supposed to heal the newbie." Placing a glowing hand on her stomach started to heal her. There was no physical change to my sister, except for the fact that she looked more and more relaxed as he got sweatier and sweatier, probably from exertion. Eventually he sat back on the other bed, panting hard.

"You Apollo campers are all the same," Karuna stated, annoyed, as she placed her hand in roughly the same area that Jason did. "You don't use your powers often enough to become strong with them. You just use them when your desperately in need of them, but that makes you tired and worse in combat."

"Whatever. Your just angry because you can't rely on your powers in combat unless you know of an injury that the enemy has," Jason argued back, rather loudly.

Now I, being very knowledgeable, noticed that if they didn't shut their traps, they would end up waking Zyli, so I spoke up, "Hey, guys. If you don't shut your mouths, I'll throw you out that window." Immediately they shut their mouths, but they still continued to glare angrily at each other.

Eventually the four hours ended and I poured the nectar into my little sister's mouth. The two helpers stayed with us the entire time I was waiting for Zyli to recover, but they did occasionally get up and leave to get something or the other. By this point, Jason was playing his Gameboy, and Karuna was reading a teen magazine. I, on the other hand, was absent-absentmindedly twisting and turning a Rubik cube that Karuna supplied me with to pass the time.

"Ugh," Zyli muttered as she opened her eyes slowly, "Zahi, where are we? Can you close the blinds too? The light's hurting my eyes." In an instant I had the blinds closed and was at her side. I then felt her forehead to make sure that she wasn't feverish or anything. I know that it's usually only girls that can tell that sort of thing, but my body is extremely sensitive to any changes in heat for some reason.

"Zyli! How are you feeling? Do you hurt? Are you feeling sick?" I asked as fast as my mouth could form the words.

"No, I just feel sort of groggy," she replied as she sat up. "Is there anything to eat? I'm starving." Shrugging my shoulders, I took a glance at the others who nodded and left the room.

"We're at "Camp Half-Blood," I stated, actually using the air quotes. "At the store you got hit with a poisoned arrow, and the stalkers brought us here." After I said this, she seemed to be taking in my words, when she shivered. Now, due to my overprotective nature, when it came to Zyli at least, I had the lion pelt out of our bag and around her shoulders in a millisecond.

At around that time, Chiron came striding into the room in his wheelchair. He seemed surprised to see the lion pelt for some reason, but nevertheless, said, "I have something important to tell you. It may shock you and you may not believe me, but I'm telling you the truth. You need to know that Greek mythology is real, the gods, the monsters, everything."

"So, is that it?" Zyli inquired after a short pause.

"You're not surprised?" Chiron asked in disbelief. "You're among the few to take it so well."

"Well, we figured something was up," I replied, leaning back in my chair. "We've been chased by large, savage dogs, dogs with flippers, and by part-human, part-donkey, and part-metal freaks for six weeks. I just killed a bull-man and his lion buddy four days ago. Not much comes as a shocker after that."

"You took them both on _at the same time_!" Percy exclaimed with his jaw on the floor, "I could barely defeat the minotaur by myself when I first came here! How did you possibly manage to take on and defeat them both at roughly the same time!"

"You could say it was a great accomplishment, but no matter which way you slice it, it comes out to me being lucky," I replied casually, carefully guarding my inner thoughts and emotions that had resurfaced with the memory, "I just threw a pipe into a gas pump like a javelin and the explosion killed the monsters."

"Wait, you killed a minotaur and a nemean lion at the same time!" Karuna asked as she entered from the hallway, "We heard Percy yelling and got up here in time to hear the rest."

"So what. It's not _that_ big a deal is it? Not worth creating a fuss about to me," Jason said in his usual bored and arrogant tone, "Everyone in this room could do the same."

Seeing my thunderous expression, Zyli quickly changed the subject. "Could we get a tour of the camp if we're staying? I'd kinda like to know where I'm going when I'm walking around."

My mind immediately jumped to the thought that we were leaving, and my mouth quickly caught up and shouted the words, _"We are not staying here in this place!"_ loud enough that I'm sure the campers were wondering who incurred the wrath of Zeus or something. I'd never really thought things through before acting, a flaw of which I was reminded when I saw Zyli's terrified expression and the slight, but steady backward motion she was using to put distance between us. The second the words left my mouth, I realized my mistake. People had always told me that I looked a lot like my dad, and when I shouted like him as well, it was just too much for Zyli, who still had daymares about the abuse we were put through. Deciding to make things right before calming down, I picked Zyli up off the bed, gave her the biggest hug I'd given her since we ran away, and hummed that same lullaby that I hummed earlier. I also told her that we'd stay if that's what she wanted, though it was loud enough for the others to hear as well.

"I'd like that," she said, also loud enough for the others to hear, after which they immediately started expressing their excitement about having new members. Even Jason seemed a little upbeat.

"Splendid! Now, how about you two get ready for bed?" Chiron announced as the others settled down, "We'll get you situated tomorrow after breakfast, which starts at nine.

Deal?"

To this, both Zyli and I agreed and stretched out on the beds as the others left. I knew Zyli wouldn't sleep and that she'd probably end up in my bed, but I wished her a good night regardless.

**A/N: Sorry about the extremely long wait for this chapter. It just got put on temporary hiatus, but it's back now. No one's correctly guessed the siblings' god parent(s) yet and I could really use a review a motivator right about now, so R&R!**


End file.
